Archive for June, 2011

Morning Bloggers, here at i2Art gallery on Saturday we had our private view for our exciting new Summer Exhibition. The weather graced us with the perfect day for it; the Pimm’s was going down well! In case anybody missed it, we took some photos for you!

Here is a picture of Gilly Marklew and friend; Gilly is a watercolour artist that is featured in the Summer Exhibition, and also teaches Watercolour Painting and Drawing to adult learners in the Cambridge area.

Annie Hall, talented local portrait artist, with Graz, who is part of the team here at i2Art! Annie also does commission work, which are ideal gifts!

Artist Judy Logan looking wonderfully vibrant by her painting, ‘You are always on my mind’ (above). Judy is a painter and printmaker based in Cambridge. She is part of the Cambridge Artworks Group who are featuring in the Cambridge open studios this weekend.

Lovely Sarah, head of the i2Art team, with Judy next to one of Judy’s innovative aquatint prints, ‘Perfect Landing’.

Althea Braithwaite is a former children’s book writer and publisher, who in 2003 acquired a kiln, which led from hobby to obsession as she produces her beautiful vibrant coloured glass works. Here she is with two of her works, ‘Desert Sand’ (left) and ‘Fen Sunset’ (right).

Annie with two of her larger portraits in charcoal, ‘Self Portrait’ (left) and ‘Portrait’ (right), and another Judy Logan crow print, an etching entitled ‘Speed Crow’.

Local art enthusiasts, Alison’s Mum Sonya (right) and good friend Hazel (Left) standing with Alison from the i2Art team.

One of Colin Chetwood’s delicate flower lamps, ‘Baby Bedside Cream Light’ we have here in the i2Art Gallery Summer Exhibition.

Unfortunately Loukas Morely could not make the Private View, but that did not stop us from admiring his beautiful paintings and prints, ‘Gesture (pair)’ (above), and three of his ‘Basket’ prints in Yellow, Cyan and Magenta.

Some more of Loukas’ work including ‘Gesture I’ (right) and ‘Gesture with White’ (left).

Another picture of Althea with fellow glass artist Helen Curtis. Helen is a former analytical chemist, and she has a scientific rather than artistic approach to her work; her scientific influences are clear in her stunning fused glass pieces.

Our Summer Exhibition window display here at the i2Art Gallery, including work by Colin Chetwood (lamp), Katie Lynn (Fused glass flowers in window), Helen Curtis (Fused glass turquoise dish), Sophie Howard (Human form sculptures) and Sue Law, with her Purple Party Shoes, a piece that offers an interesting point of view when looking at sense of space.

The display in another room in our historic building, showing Marc Greco’s lovely bird prints, alongside some of Judy Logan’s smaller pieces, and glass work by Althea Braithwaite, Helen Curtis and Katie Lynn.

That’s it from us at i2Art Gallery, but watch this space for more exciting news about our ‘Summer Exhibition’ and further information on the artists exhibiting.

Widely established photographer Noel Myles is one of the artists exhibiting in our Summer Exhibition here at i2 Art Gallery. Throughout his work there is a persistent aim to extend the still photographic image beyond the single moment and the static viewpoint. The intention is to evoke the perception of accumulated experience. His photographs establish a form of depiction that refers to moving film and single-frame photography but which is independent of both.

“The prints in this exhibition are all PALLADIUM PRINTS. Palladium along with platinum and gold comprise the Noble Metals. I make light-sensitive salts with Palladium and coat artist’s pure cotton paper by hand. The negatives are then exposed in contact with the paper to make the image. Each individual rectangle in these pictures corresponds to a complete (uncut) negative. Many dozens of negatives are sorted before the final image is composed. They can be taken over the period of several weeks.”

“I want to liberate my still photographs from the static viewpoint and the single moment. They do not record a fixed position in time or space. They are composed in the studio not in the camera. I hope they encourage prolonged contemplation that moving film does not provide and that these accumulated compositions present and extended sends of experience in a still image that a single-frame photograph does not achieve.”

Myles’s pictures have been shown in solo and mixed exhibitions that include the V&A Museum, National Museum of Photography, Film and Television, National Portrait Gallery, Contemporary Art Society, Royal College of Art, Royal Academy of Art, Royal Photographic Society and the Serpentine Gallery. Noel has been Artist-in-Residence for Rowe and Maw, Shaftesbury PLC and ITN.

“I had one print exhibited for a year in the V&A’s History of Photography display. During the past 2 years, my pictures have been shown in the Art Fairs in New York, London and Amsterdam.”

Our next exhibition, the Summer Exhibition is nearly here, and we have a lot of exciting new work to show, so please feel free to come along the the private view, next Saturday 25th June, 2 til 4pm to enjoy the show alongside a glass of Pimm’s!

Part of both the LandMarks and our coming summer exhibition is local Glass Artist Katie Lynn.

Katie Lynn has lived in Saffron Walden most of her life and studied Art Foundation at Braintree College following with a degree in Mural design at Chelsea School of Art. Having experimented with lots of different mediums she found that the colour and the cutting of glass was what she really loved when constructing a stained glass window.

After leaving college Katie travelled South East Asia and lived in Australia and New Zealand for eighteen months. A six month solo trip to South America in 1995 provided a wealth of inspiration.

Since having her first child in 2000 Katie has concentrated on the children, but missed being creative. Having long wanted to explore kiln fusing she bought a small kiln two years ago and has been experimenting with fused glass pieces.

In 2009 Katie began making Christmas decorations including Stars, Christmas trees and snowflakes and sold them at craft fairs. She also makes rings, cuff links and cards that are available in ‘Talents’ in Saffron Walden and ‘Gifted’ in Thaxted. Katie is currently working on a range of brooches and buttons. Last summer Katie started to look into how she could translate the wild, bold, bright colours and crazy forms of nature in to her glass work. This led to her latest and most exciting project “Flowers from Wonky Land”.

Collections of wonderful colourful flowers with lots of individual quirky bits added. The flowers either stand in a wooden base or can be hung on the wall.

i2 Art presents a collection of diverse artwork from selected artists both familiar and new to the gallery.

We have a new range of pieces by two of our most popular artists; Colin Chetwood’s gorgeous flower lamps and Sophie Howard’s waxed terracotta
figures. Come and see our delightful summer range of paintings, prints, portraits, photography, sculpture and glass to suit all tastes and at reasonable prices. Find the perfect piece for your home, a gift for a friend or wedding present, or simply come in and browse!

Please come along to the Private View on Saturday 25 June 2-4pm when you can meet the artists and enjoy the beautiful gallery space with a glass of Pimm’s and lemonade.

Today we are looking at two of our painters in our LandMarks exhibition here at i2Art, Isobel Stemp and Gill Townsend.

Cornfield – Isobel Stemp

Isobel Stemp lives in Cambridge, and is the daughter of two painters, and was thus brought up with a brush in her hand. Her mother taughter her about colour, has been a huge source of inspiration and encouragement. She studied an Art Foundation at Anglia Ruskin University, before moving onto an academic route, reading Theology and Religious Studies at Leeds University, but has returned to painting, drawing on all of her influences to date.

Poppies & Tree Clump – Isobel Stemp

Isobel works with gouache and acrylics, using her attic as a studio; her paintings are expressive whilst still retaining a calming quality on the viewer. Weather permitting, she paints outdoors. Flowers, buildings and landscape are her main interests. Withing these subjects, infinite possibilities unravel as the rhythm of life is sensed through them. Colour is another main source of information; a lot of Isobel’s paintings are colour-led. She finds that vibrant colour is the most direct form of communication. She uses it to express mood, create atmosphere and she likes to celebrate with it sharing the things she finds beautiful through colour.

High Summer – Isobel Stemp

Exhibitions:

‘I am currently exhibiting work at Cambridge Contemporary Art, Trinity Street, Cambridge. I was part of their summer and Christmas show last year.

At present I am exhibiting at The Old Fire Engine House, Ely (May 4- June 5) and have shown there on numerous occasions in mixed and solo exhibitions.

I am a fully participating member of The Cambridge Open Studio and have taken part for the last four years in the July event.

In Cambridge I was involved in a New Year show (2010) at Addenbrookes Hospital and an Opening exhibition at the Institute of Manufacturing which is part of Cambridge University Department of Engineering.’ Isobel Stemp

Gill Townsend has painted all her life but has made it her career about ten years ago. She completed the first year of a BA in Art History and Fine Art at Anglia Ruskin University to expand on ideas and techniques.

Steel on Chalk – Gill Townsend

Gill was artist in residence in November 2009 for the three days of the Newmarket Arts and Crafts Fair. She also shows at semi-amateur sites and last year one of her pieces was awarded ‘best in show’ by Antony Green RA, and a cash prize award for another piece of work in another show.

June Woods – Gill Townsend

Gill describes her style is impressionist/ abstraction, heavily dependent on mood both internal and external with landscape her favourite genre. Most of her inspiration comes from Cambridge and East Anglian landscapes although having family abroad adds to this. Gill uses photography as a starting point and lets her imagination take over. She prefers oil but also enjoyes mixed-media collages.

Tony Worobiec studied fine art at The University of Newcastle upon Tyne and spent 18 years as head of a large design faculty in Dorset. He has won awards for photography in the UK and internationally, and has had work exhibited in London’s Barbican Gallery, Bradford’s National Museum of Photography and The Fox Talbot Museum Lacock. He is a founder member and current chairman of the prestigious Arena Group of Photographers.

A passionate traveller, Tony (together with his wife Eva,) has made frequent visits to the USA, documenting the depopulating areas of western Nebraska, North and South Dakota and south-eastern Montana. The culmination of this work has been the much celebrated book “Ghosts in the Wilderness; Abandoned America” (published by AAPPL,) which shows numerous haunting images of deserted communities and homesteads, a graphic illustration of the American dream backfiring in a hostile land.

Tony is a Fellow of the Royal Photographic Society and was a member of that society’s Distinctions Panel for Visual Arts. He is a fine art photographer with work in the permanent collection of The Royal, The Fox Talbot Museum and in numerous private collections here in the UK, in Europe, Japan and in The States. He has published a number of books on photography including, “Black and White Photography in the Digital Era” (David and Charles), “The Complete Digital Guide to Night and Low Light Photography”, and “The Digital SLR Expert; Landscape” (David & Charles).